56 ex-judges throw weight behind Madras HC judge

NEW DELHI: Expressing solidarity with Madras precocious court justice Justice G R Swaminathan, 56 erstwhile judges Friday issued an unfastened missive urging members of Parliament to retreat the impeachment announcement against him.

They warned that the determination undermines judicial independency and seeks to unit judges who bash not align with definite governmental oregon ideological expectations.Signatories see erstwhile SC judges Adarsh Goel and Hemant Gupta, Justice Anil Deo Singh (ex-CJ Rajasthan HC), Justice Narsimha Reddy (ex-CJ Patna HC), Justice P B Bajanthri (ex-CJ Patna HC) and Justice Subhro Kamal Mukherjee (ex-CJ Karnataka HC).The announcement was filed aft Justice Swaminathan, acting connected a petition by a right-wing activist, directed authorities authorities to guarantee that a ineffable lamp beryllium lit astatine a hilltop temple.

Govt officials said this went against the longstanding signifier of lighting the lamp astatine the adjacent Deepa Mandapam, wherever the ritual had been observed for years.In their letter, the erstwhile judges sharply criticised the effort to region him. "We, the erstwhile Judges of SC and erstwhile CJs and Judges of HCs, instrumentality superior objection to the effort being made by definite MPs and different elder advocates to impeach Justice G R Swaminathan of Madras HC.

This is simply a brazen effort to browbeat judges who bash not autumn successful enactment with the ideological and governmental expectations of a peculiar conception of society.

If specified an effort is permitted to proceed, it would chopped astatine the precise roots of our ideology and independency of judiciary."They stressed that the reasons cited by the MPs bash not warrant specified a drastic step. "Even if the reasons mentioned by the signatory MPs are taken astatine look value, they are wholly inadequate to warrant resorting to specified a rare, exceptional & superior law measurement arsenic impeachment," the connection said.The erstwhile judges further warned that utilizing impeachment to situation judicial decisions poses a sedate menace to the regularisation of law. "The precise intent of the impeachment mechanics is to uphold the integrity of the judiciary, not to person it into a instrumentality of arm-twisting, signalling and retaliation. To wield the menace of removal arsenic a means of compelling judges to conform to governmental expectations is to crook a law safeguard into an instrumentality of intimidation.Such an attack is "anti-democratic, anti-constitutional, and an anathema" to the regularisation of law. The contiguous effort to impeach a sitting precocious tribunal justice for discharging his judicial work is, therefore, not an isolated occurrence but portion of a continuing battle connected dignity and independency of the judicial instauration itself. Today, the people whitethorn beryllium 1 judge; tomorrow, it volition beryllium the instauration arsenic a whole," they said.They besides noted that this reflects a wider signifier of unit connected the judiciary. According to them, caller years person seen akin attempts to onslaught oregon discredit erstwhile main justices Dipak Misra, Ranjan Gogoi, S A Bobde and D Y Chandrachud, arsenic good arsenic existent CJI Justice Surya Kant, whenever their decisions upset governmental groups. They said specified efforts purpose to usage impeachment and nationalist disapproval arsenic tools to power judges alternatively than prosecute successful genuine ineligible critique.